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Least favorite playable races - rant thread

    • 694 posts
    September 6, 2017 4:38 PM EDT

    Alright so now that we know that basically everyone loves dark elves and cats, what's your least favorite race to play and why? Is it that you just can't get into the mindset or relate? Maybe you don't care for the culture, the region, or the religion and lore. Maybe bonuses to skills don't typically mesh with your playstyle.

    Don't hold anything back. Let's hear it. 

    • 585 posts
    September 6, 2017 4:44 PM EDT

    I predict some Dunmer hate coming this way for some reason...

    • 700 posts
    September 6, 2017 4:55 PM EDT

    Argonians are sap-sucking, rainbow-headed, feathery alien nightmares that worship a tree and look terrible in literally everything they wear. They should be crawling on all fours and stay in their mud huts in Blackmarsh. I tried to play one once and quit before level 5 because I couldn't stand having green scaly hands and looking derpy AF whenever I tried wearing anything. They have every right to autonomy and to pursue their happiness, so long as its way the hell away from me, my Nords, and my Dunmer fam. I'm GLAD the truce ended after ESO. 

    Histskin is stupid.
    Waterbreathing is stupid.
    Their tails are stupid. 

    Anything that voluntarily lives in a swamp is something I don't want to be friends with. 

    /rant


    This post was edited by Legion at September 6, 2017 4:57 PM EDT
    • 224 posts
    September 6, 2017 4:57 PM EDT

    My least favorite race to play as is a tie between Bosmer, Orc, and Dunmer.

    I don't like the Bosmer simply because there really isn't anything cool about them except for they are Hippie Cannibals who are great with a Bow. That is literally it.

    I don't like the Orsimer simply because they are the exact same thing in any Fanstay setting, and by that I mean they just brutes. There really isn't any variation.

    I don't like the Dunmer simply because they are the most overrated race in the ES universe. Everybody claims oh their architecture are unique, yeah so is every other race's style of architecture. Oh, they had living Gods who achieved CHIM, yeah so did the Nords with Wulfharth and Talos. They worship the "Good" Daedra because they taught them secrets to survive, Nah they were just edgelords who wanted to be different.


    This post was edited by David at September 6, 2017 5:03 PM EDT
    • 1441 posts
    September 6, 2017 5:21 PM EDT

    David said:

    My least favorite race to play as is a tie between Bosmer, Orc, and Dunmer.

    I don't like the Bosmer simply because there really isn't anything cool about them except for they are Hippie Cannibals who are great with a Bow. That is literally it.

    I don't like the Orsimer simply because they are the exact same thing in any Fanstay setting, and by that I mean they just brutes. There really isn't any variation.

    I don't like the Dunmer simply because they are the most overrated race in the ES universe. Everybody claims oh their architecture are unique, yeah so is every other race's style of architecture. Oh, they had living Gods who achieved CHIM, yeah so did the Nords with Wulfharth and Talos. They worship the "Good" Daedra because they taught them secrets to survive, Nah they were just edgelords who wanted to be different.

    The Arcanium's librarian is an Orc mage, and in Arcanum: Of Steam and Magic, orcs could be curators, bankers, etc. Oblivion had an Orc nobleman 

    • 275 posts
    September 6, 2017 5:24 PM EDT

    Legion said:

    Argonians are sap-sucking, rainbow-headed, feathery alien nightmares that worship a tree and look terrible in literally everything they wear. They should be crawling on all fours and stay in their mud huts in Blackmarsh. I tried to play one once and quit before level 5 because I couldn't stand having green scaly hands and looking derpy AF whenever I tried wearing anything. They have every right to autonomy and to pursue their happiness, so long as its way the hell away from me, my Nords, and my Dunmer fam. I'm GLAD the truce ended after ESO. 

    Histskin is stupid.
    Waterbreathing is stupid.
    Their tails are stupid. 

    Anything that voluntarily lives in a swamp is something I don't want to be friends with. 

    /rant

    1. You don't need to be green. I used to have a blood-red argonian with bright blue eyes and loved him.

    2. They can't look good with helmets but that's it. Some of the bulkier armors can also look awkward but when it comes to the "scaly" armors like dragonscale nothing can beat them in fashion, they also look really good in steel plate.

    3. Histskin is the best racial power in the game by a long shot, especially if you wear armor that increases health regen since it applies multiplicatively instead of additively, even without it can turn a squishy rogue into a full-blown tank. Waterbreathing does suck though I'll give you that, so does the disease resistance.

    /rant

    Now that that's over I'd have to say my own least favorite race is imperials (not the faction, the race. Ulfric dies in most of my playthroughs). I don't like their "Voice of the Emperor" since the same can be done with illusion magic with better results, same with the nord's "War Cry". Their racial passive for money also sucks since it only adds like 40-50 gold every 500 you find, which is okay early on but completely useless by level 20-30, at least a nord's frost resistance helps against frost-breathing dragons for the entire game. I could get over these if only I could make a good looking imperial male, no matter what I do they never look good unless I use mods, and then they look straight out of anime. The females though...


    This post was edited by Ebonslayer at September 6, 2017 5:25 PM EDT
    • 127 posts
    September 6, 2017 5:26 PM EDT

    My least favourite has nothing to do with the race itself - It's the attitude towards them that so many seem to have that puts me off them competely.  Any attempts I make playing a Dunmer leave me feeling dissappointed, and I come away with a foul taste in my mouth.

    Not to mention, I play with Imperious - Race Overhaul. It turned my favourites list quite dramatically, but Dunmer are still the most boring race to play as for me.  Even Argonians are more interesting, and they're just lizard people.


    This post was edited by J.D. Primrose at September 6, 2017 5:28 PM EDT
    • 224 posts
    September 6, 2017 6:00 PM EDT

    Chris said:

    David said:

    My least favorite race to play as is a tie between Bosmer, Orc, and Dunmer.

    I don't like the Bosmer simply because there really isn't anything cool about them except for they are Hippie Cannibals who are great with a Bow. That is literally it.

    I don't like the Orsimer simply because they are the exact same thing in any Fanstay setting, and by that I mean they just brutes. There really isn't any variation.

    I don't like the Dunmer simply because they are the most overrated race in the ES universe. Everybody claims oh their architecture are unique, yeah so is every other race's style of architecture. Oh, they had living Gods who achieved CHIM, yeah so did the Nords with Wulfharth and Talos. They worship the "Good" Daedra because they taught them secrets to survive, Nah they were just edgelords who wanted to be different.

    The Arcanium's librarian is an Orc mage, and in Arcanum: Of Steam and Magic, orcs could be curators, bankers, etc. Oblivion had an Orc nobleman 

    Okay, that is fine and dandy, but overall they are just brutes. Yeah, there are some who break away from that, but if you look at their culture they no different from the Orcs in other fantasy games or books.

    • 13 posts
    September 6, 2017 6:43 PM EDT

    My least favorite? Maybe... Nord, Imperial, and Breton. The human races. I don't know why, but I just love playing every other race so much more. My list is basically Khajiit as number 1, Dark Elves as number 2, and everything else as number 3, with the human races coming in last. Argonians? Sure! They have a pretty cool history, and weird connection with the Hist. High Elves? Why not, I could have a character that gradually gets more humble as he learns more, or even just a Thalmor enforcer can be fun. But Bretons? Eh, they're just humans who can conjure stuff. Imperials? Straight up humans. Just. Humans. Errrgh.

    • 1595 posts
    September 6, 2017 8:14 PM EDT

    I don'treally have many rants left. ESO has made the objects of former ire, namely Bosmer and Argonians, a lot more interesting. Not so long ago I would happily trash talk the Green Gremlins and their stupid Treaty of Frond and Leaf. Frond and Leaf? Are you shitting me? Who decided that was a good name? Only a Bark Bogey could come up with a name so stupid. Most likely a male elf at that, 'coz they're all thick. I remember Glarthir and Fargoth and every male Glade Goblin to inflict their presence on us.

    But they're not stupid, see? Elder Scrolls Online kept that idea "woman are beautiful while males are ugly, trollish creatures" but made it make sense by adding nuance and a culture that made sense. That Greenpact which made no sense before (for who in their right mind would agree to anything that stops them using their surroundings to live?) now seems as deep and conflicted as any religion.

    The Argonians would have had similar treatment a whle back, too. I mean, these lizard things made no sense. None. They don't experience time like us, don't think like us, share a connection to something we can't comprehend yet we're supposed to play as them? How in the depths of hell's anus are we to play as something so freakish as to be alien? I know, let's just make them lizard-men and imprint our own humanity on them. Yeah, that'll work. 

    But then ESO makes them likeable by showing us their point of view, letting us speak to the hist and actually taking its time to show rather than tell. So upon a bit of gentle encouragement, I played a 'Gonian. And loved it.

    So no rants today. Why can't we all just get along, united under a red ruby banner? :p 

    • 284 posts
    September 6, 2017 9:18 PM EDT
    Imperials. They're just so random. They are like the default race in any fantasy game. A typical human.
    • 558 posts
    September 6, 2017 9:24 PM EDT

    Felkros said:

    My least favorite? Maybe... Nord, Imperial, and Breton. The human races. I don't know why, but I just love playing every other race so much more. My list is basically Khajiit as number 1, Dark Elves as number 2, and everything else as number 3, with the human races coming in last. Argonians? Sure! They have a pretty cool history, and weird connection with the Hist. High Elves? Why not, I could have a character that gradually gets more humble as he learns more, or even just a Thalmor enforcer can be fun. But Bretons? Eh, they're just humans who can conjure stuff. Imperials? Straight up humans. Just. Humans. Errrgh.

    You forgot Redguards.

    • 13 posts
    September 6, 2017 9:27 PM EDT

    Oh, yeah. I kinda like Redguards, actually. Not my favorite or anything, but not horrible. They seem unique, the Alikir and their views on necromancy and the demon hunters and all that interest me.

    • 278 posts
    September 6, 2017 9:35 PM EDT

    Okay, gonna get some hate with this one. 

    When I first played Elder Scrolls, (Morrowind) I thought Redguards were just plain (I hate saying this, mind you) black dudes, like I thought Nords were simple white men. I didn't no much about the lore (read as: knew nothing)

    However, Something I still don't understand is how little I enjoy Redguards. They're not original, their lore is boring and uninteresting, unlike literally any other race, and I think the poll represents this. So go back to Yokuda, redguards, and give us some Akaviri dudes.

     

    • 13 posts
    September 6, 2017 9:40 PM EDT

    Well, I like a few things about them. One, they actually stand up to the High Elves. A bit of a rarity. And, they really, really hate undead. They have a group of demon hunters, who do great work, but are barely tolerated just becuase they've come into contact with the undead so much. They come from Yokuda, a contient that sank a long time ago, and migrated to Tamriel. They refused to trade with outsiders until they had proven themselves with the Siege of Orsinium. They get mumifyed like Egyptians, and have a mix of the Nine Divines and other gods for a religion, often calling a god or godess by two diffrent names. Okay, I think I actually like Redguards abit more than I thought.

    • 278 posts
    September 6, 2017 9:42 PM EDT

    I will admit, I can admire saying 'fuck you thalmor' and they don't treat the dunmer cruelly - though to be fair, that could be just my opinion as I'm a dunmer fan.


    This post was edited by Wulfhedinn at September 6, 2017 11:55 PM EDT
    • 558 posts
    September 6, 2017 9:46 PM EDT

    Least favorite: Either Dark Elves of Redguards. They have cool lore, but they feel lame to play as. I feel like I can't connect with them at all. And how would I connect with ash-snorting bigots or sand-snorting idiots?

    • 13 posts
    September 6, 2017 10:07 PM EDT

    Well... that got a bit heated. Didn't realize how... contriversal this was.

    • 743 posts
    September 6, 2017 10:09 PM EDT

    Dunmer are by far the most overrated and least interesting race out there, in my humble opinion. They're basically discount High Elves with a much less humorful name. As David so eloquently put it, "They're basically the edgelords of the TES universe". Also, I don't like that they depend on Ulfric, someone who is in the middle of a damned war, to take care of them. Not that I'm not referring to every Dark Elf in the game, mainly the ones around Windhelm. But overall I find them quite annoying.

    • 8 posts
    September 6, 2017 10:51 PM EDT

    My pet peeve is the monolithic cultures of the races. It comes down to the tendancy of fantasy to disregard the fact that 'species' and 'race' are actually distinct words for a reason. Argonians have unique physiology to humans and so get unique racial species bonuses? Sure makes sense, but having multiple human 'species' with unique species bonuses is silly. Those should be actual racial bonuses, based on a mixture of physiological advantages and culture. Same goes for elves, do the Bosmer have some innate biological advantage over Dunmer when it comes to archery? Or is it because of the culture that they are more skilled in it? I know it's fantasy and some suspension of belief is required, but it would feel much more of a fleshed out world, and open up more interesting roleplay opportunities, if you could select your species (Human, Dunmer, Khajiit, etc.) and then race/culture (Redguard, Nord etc.).

    But wait you say! If Dunmer is the species, then there is no race to choose for them. And you're right, because fantasy worldbuilding is confused about the words species and race, and lazy when it comes to creating new species. It tends towards making them a single race with a monolithic culture, in contrast to making multiple human races with unique cultures. Think of something like the difference between the Ashlanders and city Dunmer, and having more unique races and cultures like that inside the species of Khajiit, Argonians, Orcs, etc. You could also say that elves are the species, and High Elf, Wood Elf, and Dark Elf are the races. (Orcs throw a spanner in works with this, since they are technically Mer, but so distinct from the other Mer that makes it hard to imagine them as a race of Mer, rather than a different species). Side note: Can you imagine how cool Orcs would be with distinct races and cultures? Something like the Ashlanders and City Dunmer. Having slight cultural differences between Strongholds and having small Orc regions/holds with distinct cultures from the Strongholds? GIVE ME SPECIES VARIETY

    Ahem, anyway that was a bit of a tangent on my more meta hatred of fantasy races.

    /rant

     

    • 627 posts
    September 6, 2017 11:31 PM EDT

    @Asher, I share your pain :P Knowing what little I do about biology it can be annoying at times. For instance there's the fact that all the races (other then Argonian and Khajiit) can interbreed and result in fertile offspring which would indicate that they are all the same species of creature with different phenotypic (I'm not sure how tense that word...) expressions of their genes. But since fantasy worlds have magic that is usually their go to excuse for why this is possible.

    As for the topic of this thread, my least favourite race is those dirty lizard people. Someone let Sotek know about this comment, it should get a reaction out of him ;D

    Honestly though, I don't really have a least favourite, at most I have the argonians and khajiit as the races I've played the least of, but that's not really due to a dislike of them.

    • 1441 posts
    September 7, 2017 12:51 AM EDT

    Asher said:

    My pet peeve is the monolithic cultures of the races. It comes down to the tendancy of fantasy to disregard the fact that 'species' and 'race' are actually distinct words for a reason. Argonians have unique physiology to humans and so get unique racial species bonuses? Sure makes sense, but having multiple human 'species' with unique species bonuses is silly. Those should be actual racial bonuses, based on a mixture of physiological advantages and culture. Same goes for elves, do the Bosmer have some innate biological advantage over Dunmer when it comes to archery? Or is it because of the culture that they are more skilled in it? I know it's fantasy and some suspension of belief is required, but it would feel much more of a fleshed out world, and open up more interesting roleplay opportunities, if you could select your species (Human, Dunmer, Khajiit, etc.) and then race/culture (Redguard, Nord etc.).

    But wait you say! If Dunmer is the species, then there is no race to choose for them. And you're right, because fantasy worldbuilding is confused about the words species and race, and lazy when it comes to creating new species. It tends towards making them a single race with a monolithic culture, in contrast to making multiple human races with unique cultures. Think of something like the difference between the Ashlanders and city Dunmer, and having more unique races and cultures like that inside the species of Khajiit, Argonians, Orcs, etc. You could also say that elves are the species, and High Elf, Wood Elf, and Dark Elf are the races. (Orcs throw a spanner in works with this, since they are technically Mer, but so distinct from the other Mer that makes it hard to imagine them as a race of Mer, rather than a different species). Side note: Can you imagine how cool Orcs would be with distinct races and cultures? Something like the Ashlanders and City Dunmer. Having slight cultural differences between Strongholds and having small Orc regions/holds with distinct cultures from the Strongholds? GIVE ME SPECIES VARIETY

    Ahem, anyway that was a bit of a tangent on my more meta hatred of fantasy races.

    /rant

     

    Well, there are some Trinimac worshipping Orcs 

    • 140 posts
    September 7, 2017 4:51 AM EDT

    Hmm, this could be a tough one. There's not really a Race that I "hate" flat out, more like ones that have just never interested me enough. Nords, Dunmer, and Argonians are all close for the top three (favorite), but as for my least favorite...

    At first I want to say Redguards, since I've never found their culture incredibly interesting. But still, every time I've played as one, I've always been pleasantly surprised. Adrenaline Rush is probably my favorite (Tied with Histskin) Racial Ability in the game, and the starting Skill boosts are for some of my most used Skills.

    Next I'd probably say Altmer, because I just plain hate the Thalmor (Don't mean to start anything here!). But again, when I actually play one they're not too bad, at least as Mages. I suppose some credit goes to slightly increased movement speed, as well.

    Then I'd say Khajiit, since they're basically just bipedal cats who talk funny. The biggest saving grace for them though is the different Breeds. I can't help but liken them to Dunmer Great Houses, with each having their own, unique part to play in Khajiit society.

    Bosmer and Bretons are pretty uninteresting to me as well, more so for the former. Bosmer just have so little going for them (Like David said), and the Archery bonus is really the only thing I like about them. Bretons are fine, I suppose. The Magic Resistance always helps, but their culture just seems the least unique to me, as far as ES goes. Which is actually a bit strange, since I like the real-world inspiration (French, British, Germans) quite a bit, being a descendant of those myself.

    Then it's down to Orcs and Imperials. I suppose Orcs aren't too bad. ES did a good job at making them more than just the monsters in other fantasy games, otherwise they'd easily be my least favorite.

    To be honest, the only reason Imperials aren't automatically at the bottom of the list is because of how much I like real world Roman culture. From an in-game perspective though, definitely the least interesting. Whether that makes them my least favorite Race...Well, probably :p


    This post was edited by Caesar at September 7, 2017 4:53 AM EDT
    • 558 posts
    September 7, 2017 9:37 AM EDT
    @Asher I'm pretty sure race=species in TES. Also, Redguards have no relation to Nords, Imperials, or Bretons, so they really aren't what you would call part of the human race. Anyways, I think we can all lay the blame on Tolkien for using the term race instead of species for his books.
    Edit: At least for the lasting confusion it has caused in the fantasy genre.
    This post was edited by Gollum at September 7, 2017 9:50 AM EDT
    • 457 posts
    September 8, 2017 9:31 PM EDT

    Orc. It makes no sense: their stats are fantastic for a warrior build, and greater power is arguably one of the strongest in the game. And it's not like I hate them either... I'm just not into Orsimer. 

    Case in point, the Orc build I most loved playing was because she was so opposite of what you'd expect from an Orc. 

    Bosmer come in 2nd... freaking hippie cannibals ;D xD


    This post was edited by ShinJin at September 8, 2017 9:32 PM EDT